One Month In

This morning I realized that one month ago yesterday (3/24) I arrived bright and early to building 43 on the Microsoft campus to begin NEO (New Employee Orientation) and to begin my career with Microsoft.

What a month it's been.

While all of the 24th and a good chunk of the 25th were spent in NEO, it was afterwards I got to join the team officially, meet my new co-workers and begin to learn things behind the scenes details that I would have killed to have known (and blogged about) earlier.

At the end of my first day with the team there was a team-wide meeting (a weekly thing) and when I finished introducing myself, General Manager Charlie Kindel spoke up and said "For those of you who know the I Hate Linux blog... that's him!" to which ~3/4ths of the room nodded or reacted in some way, some out of recognition... others out of... something else which I've yet to fully identify.

Since then it's pretty amazing meeting and working with people who know my work and whose work I know... even though only now am I able to put names to various components and technologies, but also names I recognized from the beta test and beta newsgroup, the forums, the official Home Server blog, the various Channel 9 and on10 videos... and even the MVPs (more on them another day).

I hate to use the word again... but it's an amazing experience being there where I'm surrounded by a group of wickedly smart and driven people who love Windows Home Server just as much (and in a number of impressive cases cases more) than me.

So what am I doing there? Sadly I can't say much (gotta love an NDA)... but aside from learning where the bathrooms are and how to find my way around the building... I've been helping out on some details which have already been discussed elsewhere, I've also begun to take ownership of some portions of the SDK and extensibility model with the question in the background of how much of it will I own in the end. Why this area and why this question?

Part of the first phone interview went something like this with the WHS Dev Manager:

Interviewer: "If you could change anything in Windows Home Server, what would that be?"

Me: <2-3 minute monolog about some of my beefs with the current extensibility system>

Interviewer: "So you think you'd like to work with the extensibility model?"

Me: "Yes... only I think saying 'extensibility model' is too limiting... I think the entire 'extensibility lifecycle' needs work because... <another 2-3 minute monolog about the current extensibility system and where I'd like to see it go>"

They seemed to like (and even agree) with some/much of what I'd said... so part of my job will be trying to find new ways that developers can utilize the platform that is Windows Home Server for new and interesting things... which is the perfect fit for a developer who spent a great deal of time trying to do just that... only now when I run into an impediment I'll be the one who can change something without the need for fist shaking (see picture 5).

Other than that I can't say much... partially because there is an NDA in place which keeps me from talking about what's coming in future in Windows Home Server or other projects/products I may have been privy to... but mostly because I've got to be heading to work now!

So Stay tuned for more info on a variety of topics, but be warned that I wont be blogging much here (at least about Windows Home Server) until after Power Pack 1 ships.